


Scars and Stars

by iimpavid



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Dogs, Gen, Poetry, Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), Therapy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-04
Updated: 2017-11-04
Packaged: 2019-01-29 05:56:14
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,211
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12624681
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iimpavid/pseuds/iimpavid
Summary: "Three histories kept caughtbetween ribcage, scars, and stars andwolves with teeth devouring. And youare alone betweenthe spine and my sternum where a wasteland exists of secrets closed and open."- M. D. Cahill





	Scars and Stars

 

Dr. Janine Fairweather’s waiting room brings a little bit of comfort to a generic high-rise with the waiting room full of bright art prints and squishy mismatched furniture, puzzles and toys stacked neatly on the shelves. She prefers to be called “Janine” rather than “Dr. Fairweather”. Bucky grabs one of the more complex 3-D puzzles and brings it into her office with him. It helps to have something to do with his hands while he talks and he’s got this particular puzzle box figured out well enough to solve and reconstruct without being distracted.

 

His therapist is nondescript, too. Dark hair always in an updo, angular glasses with plain black frames, business-casual dress. She carries herself in a way that would have made her essential in espionage and that’s probably why the government lets him see her.  _It’s not paranoia if they really are out to get you_  has become an axiom these last few months.

 

“I found this poet I like,” he says after giving her the rundown of his week to date, absently petting Soba while he talks. His borzoi is out of her vest and taking up most of the sofa, sprawled on her back, half in his lap, demanding a proper belly rub. “On twitter. I guess they call it flash poetry? She writes stuff on post-its and takes pictures of ‘em or just tweets all this stuff about stars and wolves and… I dunno it kind of just sticks, y’know?”

 

This is the sort of thing he’s supposed to bring up: his interests and hobbies. At least that’s what the internet has suggested when he googled “what do I talk about in therapy”. It’s either this or his relationship with his parents and he doesn’t see what two people who’re over 75 years dead have to do with his spectacularly messed up present.

 

Janine looks like she’s about to tell him, “I don’t. Could you explain?” but to his surprise, she goes with, “Do you have a favorite poem of hers?” instead.

 

He laughs to himself. “Yeah, yeah I do. I don’t think I saved the picture from Twitter but lemme see…” He picks the puzzle up from the side table to dismantle it. It’s a pretty trick to manage with a lapful of service dog to work around but Soba is amicable enough to being used as a table. 

 

He pulls a few more pieces from the puzzle box and recites, in slow phrases that sometimes stumble as he recalls them, “[Three histories kept caught/ between ribcage, scars, and stars and/ wolves with teeth devouring. And you/ are alone between/ the spine and my sternum where a wasteland exists of secrets closed and open.](http://www.aprilmillerphd.tumblr.com/)”

 

The silence in the wake of the poem is full of anticipation. Bucky, inexplicably, feels like crying. He stares at the wallpaper behind Janine and rubs Soba’s belly. The wallpaper is printed with vines and leaves in subdued green ink. 

 

This is the part of therapy he’s not keen on: looking at the empty places .

 

Janine says, “And?”  

 

“That’s it, that’s all she wrote.”

 

“I can see that it resonates with you,” she tries again, “What do you think it means?”

 

That gets him to make eye contact again, if only to grace her with a wry smile, “You’re asking me, the guy who didn’t graduate high school and has a brain like a fried egg, what poetry means?”

 

“That’s exactly what I’m doing.”

 

The puzzle box is in pieces now, laid out neatly across his thigh and balanced on the slope of Soba’s chest. He decides to see if it’ll stay together without any of its insides, just the skeleton holding itself together. “Well it’s obvious, ain’t it? The wolves might be a metaphor or whatever, it’s… It makes me sound like an asshole who’s full of himself and poetry’s not supposed to be literal, right? But that whole three histories thing. All I’ve been doing since 1942 is serving loyally— America, HYDRA, the Soviets, HYDRA again, and now back to America—  makin’ history happen ‘cause the fate of the world depended on it.”

 

This is what he likes about Janine: she asks him ridiculous questions and doesn’t mind his rambling answers. He sighs, “They’ve gone and burned it all up.” He gestures vaguely at his head with the puzzle piece he’s trying to slot into place. The box is coming together quickly in its precarious position atop his knee. “What I didn’t leave in a foxhole in Italy or in a snowbank in Austria got left on an operating room floor in Siberia. Or in that fuckin’ electric chair bullshit… All that got replaced with all the politicking and mantras and the cover identities and the ins and outs of murdering people. I’m full up.”

 

He amends, “I’m fuckin’ tired.”

 

“That’s what’s so damn funny about the CIA and the FBI and the rest of the acronym geeks following my happy ass around Manhattan every day— they’ve got it in their heads that I give a shit what happens around me now.”

 

The puzzle box’s walls are complete and he transfers it with both hands to the table beside the sofa, dropping the innards of the puzzle beside it. It’s easier to put the top together that way even if it does require Soba to suffer through no longer pillowing her head on his thigh. “I should know better than complain. But they act like I’m gonna go on a killing spree when I go out to the butcher’s for Soba’s dinner and that’s just insulting.”

 

The borzoi turns over onto her belly at her name, inching toward Bucky’s shoulder and licking his ear. He’s not expecting it and startles, violently wiping saliva away with a groan.

 

Janine laughs. “Tell me what you really think about your protective detail, please, there’s no need to spare my feelings.”

 

He settles the top pieces of the puzzle box in place with steady hands. It shivers for a moment but holds. “Protective detail, my ass. Sarcasm’s not very ladylike, you know.”

 

“Like you can talk, James.”

 

 “You  _love_  it,” he accuses. Then, “They’re so paranoid it makes me look normal. I should just do whatever the hell I want, since it’s not like they’re stop following me if I don’t. The rub is, though. The rub is that whatever the hell I want ain’t all that exciting so there’s no vindictive thrill involved with doin’ it.”

 

“So what you’re telling me is there’s no reason to do what you want if there’s no one to spite with it?”

 

He can tell looking at her that she knows she’s got it wrong, that she’s aiming to get him to correct her. “You know better ‘an that, quit pullin’ my leg.”

 

He stretches back and Soba takes this opportunity to sprawl back across his lap, head butting him in the process. Bucky grunts at her and wraps his arms around his dog to reposition her so she’s not leaning her bony elbows into his liver.

 

“I’m not gonna avoid doing the shit I like I just wish I had some privacy. I could get it, if I really wanted. Go off the grid again. It ain’t all that hard but… I’m tired of runnin’.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> [Tumblr.](https://papermoon-cardboardsea.tumblr.com/) [Twitter.](https://twitter.com/iimpavid)


End file.
